The Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O'Brien, Leslie Conly & Leonard Lubin - Series Complete

Today I finished the third Rats of NIMH book. I loved the first, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH and the second, Racso and the Rats of NIMH, is really growing on me. The characters are engaging and the premise is fun. The rats are the result of scientific experiment on intelligence enhancing drugs that is more effective than expected. The rats escape and create their own community complete with modern amenities.

The third book, R-T, Margaret, and the Rats of NIMH, didn't quite hold up to the other two. In this book, the nest is threatened when two children get lost in the woods and end up in contact with the rats. The biggest problem was that it started slow. Margaret, the older of the two kids, doesn't start out a very likable character, which while it works for her character arc, means I spent a third of the book contemplating the possibility that some kids maybe really do need a spanking. By the end, she becomes a more palatable narrator, but it took a bit. As a book: it's ok; as a series closer: I was a little disappointed. It ended the only way it could, and I like that they left an opening for continuation but it just wasn't up to the same standards as the first two.

Regardless, if I was going to put together a canon for middle grades lit, The Rats of NIMH would be on it.